Page 128 - A Handbook Genre Studies in Mass Media

CULTURAL CONTEXT

less of her sexual orientation. President of ABC daytime programming
Brian Frons witnessed a transformation in the audience’s perspective on
gay and lesbian issues during the course of the subplot: “The audience
went from ‘I don’t want to see a lesbian relationship’ to saying, ‘Bianca
should be in love.’” 14
Genric analysis can also provide insight into shifts in cultural attitudes
and behaviors. Tracing the evolution of a long-running series can also
furnish perspective into shifts in the culture. A classic example is the
Tarzan series, starring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan,
which covered a span of ten years (1932–42). Observable changes in
this series reflect the emergence of the middle class, as America moved
out of the Great Depression. Dave Kehr explains:

Watching the Tarzan series straight through tells a compelling story, though
not necessarily the one presented by their maddeningly repetitive plots. . . .
[The] lustful young lovers of the first two films soon evolve into a far more
conventional middle-class couple, [defined by] the return to materialist val-
ues that the early years of the Depression had profoundly discouraged. 15

Kehr describes an underwater swim scene in the first film, Tarzan the
Ape Man (1932), as “an amazingly frank, sexy frolic.” But by the third
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film, Tarzan Escapes! (1936), the series had evolved into a middle-class
domestic story, complete with split-level tree house:

A social system is definitely imposing itself on this little corner of un-
spoiled nature. . . . The couple that seemed so bohemian, living blissfully
beyond society in the first two films, are now struggling homeowners.
Jane stands cooking in the kitchen, while Tarzan heads off for work each
morning [gathering food] with the grim determination of a seasoned
commuter. 17

With the addition of their son in the later films, some of the formulaic
elements of the series were reworked. By Tarzan Finds a Son (1939), the
erotic swim scenes were transformed into a wholesome family activity.
In addition, the characters changed over the course of the series. Kehr
observes, “Jane seems more and more like a suburban matron, presiding
over her little patch of upstate paradise. . . . Cheetah, Tarzan’s lovable
chimpanzee companion, has now become a sort of comic maid, helping
Jane wash the dishes and operating the rope and pulley fan system that
Tarzan has constructed to cool their arboreal retreat.” 18

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